Don't just sit there, do something!!
 

Maybe it's time to start that career as a professional stock car driver :)

1: Brain Res Mol Brain Res. 2005 Mar 24;134(1):170-9.

Environmental enrichment in adulthood eliminates neuronal death in experimental
Parkinsonism.

Faherty CJ, Raviie Shepherd K, Herasimtschuk A, Smeyne RJ.

Department of Developmental Neurobiology, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital,
Mail Stop 323, 332 North Lauderdale, Memphis, TN 38017, USA.

Idiopathic Parkinson's disease (PD) affects 2% of adults over 50 years of age.
PD patients demonstrate a progressive loss of dopamine neurons in the substantia
nigra pars compacta (SNpc). One model that recapitulates the pathology of PD is
the administration of 1-methyl-4-phenyl-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine (MPTP). Here
we show that exposure to an enriched environment (EE) (a combination of
exercise, social interactions and learning) or exercise alone during adulthood,
totally protects against MPTP-induced Parkinsonism. Furthermore, changes in mRNA
expression would suggest that increases in glia-derived neurotrophic factors,
coupled with a decrease of dopamine-related transporters (e.g. dopamine
transporter, DAT; vesicular monoamine transporter, VMAT2), contribute to the
observed neuroprotection of dopamine neurons in the nigrostriatal system
following MPTP exposure. This non-pharmacological approach presents significant
implications for the prevention and/or treatment of PD.

PMID: 15790541 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Oh So RIGHT!!

A group of us are finishing up five days of meeting and brainstorming and planning our projects future.

A bunch of PWPs who may have to crawl on the floor from time to time...may have to getting into a very weird position on the floor to unlock dystonic shoulders in the early morning...may have to take extreme care to manage going up and down stairs, etc...BUT...in doing so we were also working through this processes of planning and brainstorming, and hanging stickie sheets on the wall, we prove indirectly that continuing to find ways to use the mind keeps our PWP minds sharp.

Exercising physically or mentally if sooooo important.
Personally, I haven't exersiced physically in a few months, but I do exercise my mind. SHAME on me :(

There are many PWPs who have found "hobbies" to take up after quitting "office" work. The creativity "catalog" prepared as a result of the art contributed for display during the 2006 WPC is a prime example of this.

It is filled with intricate wooden pens made with tremored hands...video and photography prepared by dystonia and tremored hands, some award winning...website development by people who never considered such work would be in their life...new poets...etc etc.

So, it is not just "get up and move" the body, but git up and move the mind ;)

I will leave it at that and get on to my 3 hour drive home...yikes...;)

:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)